Confessions of a Budding Locavore

 

For the past several months I have been going to the farmer's market in Goshen, the town just south of here. This past Saturday I went for my bi-weekly shopping. I live in an area that is next to one of the largest Amish areas in the US. There are also small farms scattered around the area so there is enough food grown even in winter to enable the market to stay open year round.

I could buy the food cheaper at a supermarket, but it wouldn't be the same food. The salad mix I bought from Kate who runs Sustainable Greens, which is just over the state line in Michigan, was picked the day before. Her micro mix is an assortment of spicy greens that adds a wonderful bite to my salads. I also got fresh asparagus from the Amish woman who I have been buying sweet potatoes from. A few months ago, I bought some hulled black walnuts from her. She cautioned me to be careful as they had been hulled by her elderly mother. (The walnuts were perfectly hulled without a trace of a shells.) She doesn't have any more sweet potatoes now, but I got some beautiful locally grown ones at the Maple City Market, the food co-op in Goshen.

Before leaving the farmer's market, I also bought some locally made cheese and fresh radishes. The tiny baby carrots (natural ones not the machine-produced ones sold at supermarkets) were not available this time but I had bought two batches last time and delighted in their colors and sweetness. I still had some eggs from the farmer who assured me he had no roosters so his free-range, naturally raised chickens only gave infertile eggs.

At the co-op I also bought Trader's Point Creamery raspberry yogurt. Located in central Indiana, Trader's Point's cows are pasture raised and are not given artificial hormones or antibiotics. Nor does the creamery use pesticides or artificial fertilizers on their land. The yogurt is wonderful and comes in glass bottles that are ideal for storing other foods when empty or for recycling.

I can't get greens like this at the supermarket. Or asparagus. Or raspberry yogurt.

At the supermarket, I can't talk to the farmers and ask how their food was raised. I can't buy dairy products secure in the knowledge the cows and chickens were raised humanely, and the land was treated with respect and in a sustainable manner. I can't buy food that was picked the day before at the height of its taste and food value, and which traveled not 1500 or even a few thousand miles, but merely ten or thirty or a hundred miles. I can't experience the joy of seeing that a favorite food is now in season and relish the taste made all the more enjoyable by its rarity.

But at the farmer's market and co-op, I can.

I can talk to the farmers. I can buy food raised for taste, not for its ability to travel great distances. I can eat dairy products knowing the animals were raised with care and respect. I can enjoy local foods knowing the land they grew on was carefully stewarded, not plundered until it was worthless. I can chat with the people standing next to me as we wait our turn to make our purchases. I can drive home, relaxed and happy in the knowledge that I did my very best to  "do no harm."